Isaac Asimov
Isaac Asimov is a famous 20th century science fiction writer. He was a Russian-born author. He is perhaps the most important author of the so called American Science Fiction's Golden Age. He is also known as one of "The Big Three" of science fiction together with Robert Heinlein and Arthur C. Clarke. Some of his most famous works are I, Robot, Nightfall and Foundation Trilogy. He was author of science fiction, wrote popular science writings, guides to the bible and science, mystery novels, literature comentary (his works on Shakespeare) and history. Biography He was born on Petrovichi, Russia. He studied biochemistry and was a Ph.D. in 1948. He wrote a textbook on that subject also. He spent three years during World War II working as a civilian. He started writing for science fiction magazines like Astounding. He published in 1950 under Doubleday his first novel: Pebble in the Sky. He wrote a collection of robot stories called I, Robot. He then later wrote his Foundation series. A short tale that has been very famous and probably one of the author's favorites is The Last Question. It is about the fight against entropy. Every good amount of years a question is performed about stopping entropy. The question is done to the best computer in each epoch. He died in 1992. His wife has published some tales about Norby, a fictional robot created by him. Personality Although Jewish born, he was not a practicioner. He was a rationalist and had an skeptic world view that is reflected in his science articles. He was against the law to revive Creationism in schools in Reagan era. He was claustrophile, he liked small spaces. He was also afraid of flying and did not think it was contradictory with his characters flying spaceships. That was his characters not him and it was fiction, according to some of his answers to this question. Novels *Foundation trilogy (6 novels) *Nemesis *Stars like dust *Caves of steel *Robots and Empire *The end of eternity *Lucky Starr series *The naked sun *Peeble in the sky *Currents of space *The Child of Time (with Robert Silverberg) *The Positronic man (with Robert Silverberg) *Murder at the ABA Short stories * I, Robot (1950), * The Martian Way and Other Stories (1955) * Earth Is Room Enough (1957) * Nine Tomorrows (1959) * The Rest of the Robots (1964) * Through a Glass, Clearly (1967) * Nightfall and Other Stories (1969) * The Early Asimov (1972) * The Best of Isaac Asimov (1973) * Buy Jupiter and Other Stories (1975) * The Bicentennial Man and Other Stories (1976) * The Complete Robot (1982) * The Winds of Change and Other Stories (1983) * The Alternate Asimovs (1986) * The Best Science Fiction of Isaac Asimov (1986) * Robot Dreams (1986) * Azazel (1988) * Gold (1990) * Robot Visions (1990) * Magic (1995) * Tales of the Black Widowers series (6 collections) * Asimov's Mysteries (1968) * The Union Club Mysteries (1980) Science divulgation *Left hand of the electron *Asimov's guide to science *New Asimov's guide to science *Asimov's Biographical Encyclopedia of Science and Technology (1972) History *The Egyptians *The Near East: 10,000 Years of History *The Greeks *The Roman Republic *The Roman Empire Guides *Asimov's Guide to the Bible *Asimov's Guide to Shakespeare Book themes Psychohistory It is a fictional science created in the Foundation series. It was invented by Hari Seldon, a scientist. It is a science of future behavior of large masses of people. People can be treated like the molecules of a gas: they are millions but the gas itself (humanity) can be treated as a unit. This science worked over several million people (the human population of the galaxy in the times of the Foundation) and predicted the behavior of humanity as a whole. Seldon predicted the fall of the Galactic Empire who was governing the galaxy at that time. He predicted there would be 25000 years of darkness, but he could shrink it to 1000 if some minor changes could be performed. For that, he created a "Foundation" of encyclopedists in a far planet. The Encyclopedia was a trick to fool the Emperor. The real plans of the Foundation were to advance scientifically and to get and create weapons so they would become invincible. This Foundation would later attack the Empire, emerging as the conquerors and would try to revive the lost empire. He created also a "Second Foundation" which would have mental powers. The first Foundation would know nothing about the second, for his plans to be accomplished succesfully. He then located the Second Foundation on "the opposite side of the galaxy" with respect to the former. Nevertheless, Seldon could never predict the destiny of individuals with his science. So he could not predict the rise of a new human being, a mutant called "The Mule" who had mental powers and could manipulate the emotions of others. That is the universe of the Foundation series, or Trantor universe as it is called, honouring the name of the planet where the Foundation is. Asimov himself confessed that this Galactic Empire was inspired by the historical Roman Empire. So, the thousand of years of darkness was the era called The Dark Ages. There are some characters directly inspirated by the Roman Empire, like the General Bel Riose who is thought to be inspired by Flavius Belisarius, the last great general of the Roman Empire during the 6th century AD. The Three Laws of Robotics In most of his stories about robots, the robots are suppoused to follow these laws. Usually the plots are based on dilemas arisen by the clash of two of the laws or the different possible interpretations of them. Many of these stories are collected in I, Robot. Like most of his short stories he published them during the 40s and 50s (the Golden Age mentioned above) in pulp magazines. The laws: #A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm. #A robot must obey orders given it by human beings except where such orders would conflict with the First Law. #A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law. Did you know... *Asimov was the first to use the word "Robotics"? See also There is a Wikia specifically for him and his writing. See w:c:Asimov. Asimov, IsaacAsimov, Isaac Category:Prolific Author